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November 2010

Hillenbrand tells the story of an American hero

It's a story almost too amazing to be true: An Olympic runner serving as an airman in World War II is marooned on a raft after a plane crash. He and his companion are rescued—by the enemy—and held in a POW camp. But even the remarkable bare bones of the story don't convey all of what there is to discover in Unbroken, a true...

Spunky Southern heroine's coming-of-age

Susan Gregg Gilmore hit the Southern fiction scene with a bang with her delicious debut, Looking for Salvation at the Dairy Queen. Her second novel, The Improper Life of Bezellia Grove, is a coming-of-age story set in Gilmore's own hometown of Nashville during the 1950s and 1960s. As the title indicates, Bezellia is not the prim...

7 Questions with . . . Kim Cash Tate

Kim Cash Tate went from law partner to novelist when her first book, Heavenly Places, was published in 2008. Her second novel, Faithful, has just been released by Thomas Nelson and tells the story of three successful best friends facing personal, work and romantic challenges. Tate took the time to answer a few questions about writing from her...

Who Needs Vampires?

Today’s teens might be interested in sex, drugs and vampires, but Linda Sue Park is willing to give that fickle audience a bit more credit.“I just have a lot of confidence in young readers being able to handle things that maybe some adults don’t think they can handle,” says Park. The latest work by the Newbery...

Why bigger isn't always better

Go big or go home. He who dies with the most toys wins. There's no end to the figures of speech we've created to explain—or is it justify?—our growing belief that bigger=best. Sarah Z. Wexler, a resident of one of America's largest cities—New York City—traveled around the country exploring this idea in her new...

The perfume with a life of its own

Think you know all there is to know about Chanel No. 5? Think again. The perfume that famously was the only thing Marilyn Monroe wore to bed has a fascinating history revealed by English professor Tilar J. Mazzeo in The Secret of Chanel No. 5. Read on for more.Before The Secret of Chanel No. 5 you published The Widow Clicquot...

Diary of a busy man

One night last summer, author Jeff Kinney was astounded to see that the upcoming book in his Diary of a Wimpy Kid series, The Ugly Truth, was number two on Amazon’s bestseller list.“I didn’t even know what ‘The Ugly Truth’ was yet,” he remembers. “They’re printing five million of these things, and...

A painful literary legacy

How does it feel to be immortalized in fiction by a parent? That’s the central question of Mr Toppit, British author Charles Elton’s debut.Mr Toppit is your first novel, but you’ve worked in the book business for many years. Have you seen fame affect a writer and his family the way it does the Hayman clan?When I was a Literary...

An 'ordinary' woman sounds off

Lisa Scottoline answers her phone. “Hello?” she says. “Hello?” At least, I think that’s what she says. Hard to tell with the multiple dogs barking hoarsely and frantically in the background. She hangs up. I call back. “Hello?” she says, laughing. “Can you call my cell phone? I can’t hear you...

Remembering a boyhood in exile

After Waiting for Snow in Havana unexpectedly won a National Book Award in 2003, Carlos Eire began hearing from schools asking him to apply for jobs teaching Cuban history. His evocative memoir of growing up in Cuba when Fidel Castro was coming to power had led many people to assume that his academic specialty was the history of his...

Healing a Texas-sized family rift

In his powerful debut novel, Bruce Machart has created characters who are as unforgiving as the blazing heat in which they toil. A father who works his sons like horses. A husband who lies and cheats on his wife while she’s giving birth to their first son. Brothers who defend each other, but not their youngest brother. Set in the harsh...

Feature by Eliza Borné

Jon Scieszka—author of hilarious children’s classics like The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales and The True Story of the Three Little Pigs—is the king of boy books.Although he doesn’t want to be pegged as an author who only writes for boys (“I have some of the craziest girl fans!”), Scieszka tends to write action-driven stories with goofy male...

Feature by Becky Ohlsen

Graphic novels continue to break new ground, with recent works that run the gamut in both style and content. Here we take a look at four of the best new releases, ranging from a colorful tale of pirates and sea monsters to a close examination of democracy in America.A CLASSIC TALEIt took Joann Sfar’s touch to make me finally fall in love with the story of The Little Prince. Sfar’s...

Feature by Pat Broeske

The holidays are a perfect time to reach for the stars—of the celebrity kind. This season’s offerings include the cool and the classic.A COMPLICATED LADY Before she became a campy caricature as the queen of mean, Joan Crawford was a box office goddess—and one of the hardest-working women in the business. In Possessed: The Life of Joan Crawford, veteran Hollywood chronicler...

Feature by Joanna Brichetto

Thanks to the local food movement, most of us are within increasingly easy reach of foods grown or produced nearby. Yet even with community-supported agriculture programs, home gardens, farmers’ markets and enlightened grocery stores, some items remain out of reach, simply because of temperate zone limitations. You just can’t grow bananas in Nashville, for example—or can...

Whodunit Column by Bruce Tierney

All Ash Levine ever wanted was to be a cop, yet several months back, he turned in his badge at the Los Angeles Police Department, devastated over the killing of a witness he had sworn to protect. When a fellow police officer is murdered, Levine is asked to rejoin the force, at least temporarily, to head the investigation; he agrees, with apparent reluctance, which allows him to both name his...

Well Read Column by Robert Weibezahl

As he dramatized the final days of the mercurial marriage of Leo and Sofia Tolstoy in The Last Station, Jay Parini imagines the less tumultuous, but perhaps unhappier marriage of Herman Melville and his wife, Lizzie, in his new novel, The Passages of H.M. We join the couple mid-voyage, after the critical and commercial failure of Moby-Dick has sunk H.M., as he is called, into a well of despair...

Author Enablers Column by Kathi Kamen Goldmark and Sam Barry

Dear Author Enablers,After building a local platform by self-publishing, selling by word of mouth, becoming a reading group selection, giving lectures at high schools and churches, donating to literacy fundraisers and receiving unsolicited praise for my book, what do I do now to spread my net wider? My efforts to find an agent and a traditional publisher have come to naught.Jill SchaeferLompoc,...

Cooking Column by Sybil Pratt

The “Domestic Goddess” has done it again, just in time for homey holiday cooking. Nigella Kitchen is an expression of her love of cooking and of making cooking lovable, spelled out in over 200 recipes, with gorgeous, almost edible full-color photos, great header notes, reassuring directions and tips for “making leftovers right.” Nigella wants to put her...

Audio Column by Sukey Howard

The story of pain, a long-overlooked novelist and the latest from one of America's most popular writers are this month's can't-miss audiobooks.People suffer from pain and always have; it is our mortal condition. For millennia, pain was a “spiritual signifier” blamed on spirits, deities and demons, or on bad deeds committed in this life or a former one. As recently as the...

Book Clubs Column by Julie Hale

SOUTHERN COMFORTBeth Hoffman’s delightful debut novel, Saving CeeCee Honeycutt, is a sweet Southern tale with an unforgettable heroine at its center. Set in 1967, the book skillfully depicts the social dynamics of a South that’s still coming of age. After her high-strung mother—a former beauty queen named Camille—is killed by an ice cream truck, 12-year-old CeeCee...

Romance Column by Christie Ridgway

Edge of Sight by Roxanne St. Claire offers hot romance and sizzling suspense. Heroine Samantha Fairchild witnesses a murder. Afraid the assassin is out to silence her, Sam turns to friend and investigative reporter Vivi Angelino. But turning to Vivi means returning to memories of heartbreak—Sam had an affair with Vivi’s twin Zach right before his deployment as an Army Ranger...